Profile: Sonya Moyle

SONYA MOYLE

Ceramic artist Sonya Moyle creates delicate and expressive sculptures inspired by both the industrial and natural South Australian landscape. The JamFactory at Seppeltsfield Studio Tenant combines her passion for ceramics and drawing to highlight the environmental impact of land clearing, farming and industrialisation on native flora.

Words by Caitlin Eyre Caitlin is Assistant Curator at JamFactory. Growing up deep in the Adelaide Hills near the Para Wirra Conservation Park, Moyle spent much of her childhood immersed in the natural environment. As a young adult, Moyle found the environmental impact of encroaching industry on the natural landscapes particularly confronting. ‘I was driving through the Mallee and thinking about all the land that was cleared. All the hundred-year-old trees that were ripped out, burnt and destroyed,’ she reflects. ‘It made me wonder what was there beforehand.’

In her ceramic practice, Moyle recreates miniature versions of rural industrial forms in clay and decorates them with abstract drawings of nature. The drawings represent the ‘ghosts of nature’ of the pre-industrialised landscape, the muted natural colour palette, soft lines and sweeping watercolour washes casting a somewhat eerie shadow of the past across their stark and rigid forms.

In spite of Moyle’s environmentalist views and initial aversion to a manufactured landscape, she has come to find beauty in grain silos, water tanks, vats, sheds and factories that find form in her practice. ‘There is something magical in the process of taking something that’s big, raw and industrial and transforming it into a small, delicate porcelain object,’ she says. This shift was partly due to the nostalgic reactions shared by her audience. Surrounded by Moyle’s objects, onlookers would frequently share fond memories of family farms and childhoods spent in the countryside. ‘I didn’t originally think like that and somewhere in the process I’ve connected with the objects more,’ Moyle says. ’Now every time I see a tank or a big silo I get excited. I have to stop and take a photo!’

Hand-building is the primary process that Moyle uses in her practice and incorporates both slab-building and pinching techniques. The artist often crafts forms by wrapping sheets of rolled clay around Polypipe to create cylinders and then adds pre-cut bases or other structural components. While this process creates sleek and precise surfaces, Moyle also pinches clay together when crafting more rustic, tactile surfaces for her production ware range. The prepared forms are then bisque fired before being glazed and decorated with freehand drawings.

When initially planning the designs that will adorn the ceramic surfaces, Moyle creates an abstract landscape drawing on paper with pencil and watercolour, which is then printed onto a clear transparency sheet. The ceramic objects are placed in an aesthetically pleasing grouping and the image projected onto the arrangement, casting an image across the pieces in a haphazard yet charming way. Using the projection as a guide, Moyle then copies the drawings onto the objects with her own handmade ceramic pencils, watercolours and pigments. The pencils are made of clays, refractory materials and colourants which have been shaped into sticks and fired at low temperatures for optimal transference. During the initial experimentation phase, each colour recipe is individually tested to gauge how it will withstand the final firing. Despite the laborious process and the availability of commercial ceramic pencils, Moyle prefers to make her own in order to have a broader palette of colours at her disposal.

While abstraction lies at the heart of Moyle’s decorative aesthetic, she has also crafted a range of ceramic production ware that features more realistic renderings of native Australian botanicals. On these functional household objects, Moyle combines soft pencil lines with loose painterly hues to celebrate the organic beauty of iconic native blooms, including Banksia, Sturt’s Desert Pea and Eucalyptus Caesia. The pieces are studies of native Australian flora in all its glory and subtly work to provide a sense of hope in the conservation and protection of our natural treasures.